Page 34 of DFF: Delicate Freakin' Flower

“I saw one in a documentary once, it was horrifying. I still have dreams about it, so don’t mock me.”

He snorted. “You’re the one worried about being eaten by mythical swamp serpents, andI’mthe insane one?”

“She has a vivid imagination,” I added helpfully, trying not to laugh.

“I’m realistic,” Gabby muttered. “Realistic and heavily traumatized by the local ecosystem.”

Eddie just shook his head and went to unload the gear.

Once he was set up—vanishing into the trees like some kind of camo cryptid—I walked Gabby down to the clearing behind the cabin where the ground was firm, visibility was clear, and no raccoons had claimed it as sacred land.

I laid out the rifle first—a simple, bolt-action .22—and set a few tin cans up on the stump line twenty yards out.

“All right,” I said, handing it over, “let’s see what you’ve got.”

Gabby took it confidently, then hesitated and turned to me with a sheepish look. “Okay, technically, I’ve only ever shot at a range with paper targets, and I may or may not have been less than impressive.”

“Define less than impressive.”

“I once hit the ceiling of an indoor range.”

I blinked. “The ceiling?”

“In my defense, I panicked. There was a spider on my foot.”

I sighed and adjusted her grip. “Okay, you little chaos gremlin—safety first. Keep your eyes forward and take a deep breath. You’re not fighting spiders, you’re keeping your aim on the target. Control the weapon, don’t let the nerves do it for you.”

She nodded seriously, did as I'd outlined, and took her shot.

It hit the can square on.

Her jaw dropped, and she squealed, “Did you see that?”

I grinned, her excitement infectious. “Try it again.”

We spent the next two hours shooting and laughing, and she got better with every shot. Much to my embarrassment, I was half-distracted by the way her smile kept breaking through the worry in her eyes. She looked lighter out here as if the weight was lifting, piece by piece.

Afterward, we got to work on the traps.

Now, when I say “traps,” I don’t mean normal ones. I mean Townsend-Rossi special editions—the kind that involves fishing lines, noisemakers, and a lot of questionable ingenuity. We had trip alarms, tin cans full of nails, one old motion-triggered sprinkler rigged to spray anyone who got too close to the back trail, and Gabby’s favorite: a cat toy rigged to a string that would jingle whenever someone stepped past it. These were efficient but tame in comparison to the ones I'd set when she wasn't with me.

“You warned Eddie, right?” she asked, eyes wide as we tested the trip line on the eastern side.

“Yes,” I confirmed. “Three times.”

“Good. I’d hate to accidentally tangle him in fishing line and drop a bucket of marbles on his head.” She paused. “Wait, do we have marbles?”

“No.”

“Damn, that's a total missed opportunity.”

I glanced over at her—cheeks smudged with dirt, hair in a messy braid, and her t-shirt sticking slightly with sweat. She was flushed, exhausted, and still a little sore from the day before, but she was fighting.

She was trying.

As the sun started its slow slide behind the trees, tinting everything gold, I realized something: she wasn’t just surviving. She was learning how to win.

Gabby was croucheda few yards ahead of me, tying one end of a trip wire to a low tree branch with her tongue poking out in concentration. The other end led to a set of tin cans filled with nails and pebbles, ready to rattle like an angry ghost if anyone so much as breathed on it.

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